


Pray your gods

by perryvic, Zaganthi (Caffiends)



Series: Pray Your Gods [1]
Category: A Study in Emerald - Neil Gaiman, Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Alternate Universe, Dubious Consent, Elder God, Established Relationship, Implied tentacle sex, M/M, Other, Partner Betrayal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-18
Updated: 2012-12-18
Packaged: 2017-11-21 12:26:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/597750
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perryvic/pseuds/perryvic, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Caffiends/pseuds/Zaganthi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was understood that regardless of what case Lestrade brought us in the meantime, when She sent her envoy, it would be my friend's new focus.   He slept feverishly that night, and I did not sleep at all. There were half thoughts, fringe memories of that flat mirrored lake and the slick of incomprehensible eldritch limbs against my skin. I gave up on sleep, made tea in the kitchen and doctored it with laudanum, serving the both of us.  It made for a lazy morning the next day, and my back was quite poorly as I slept on the floor of his room.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pray your gods

**Author's Note:**

  * For [shadowkeeper](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowkeeper/gifts).



> Thank you to Tzigane for the beta!

These letters, this memorandum for an unknown record, are often-times my firmest solitude. It affords me an opportunity to hold strange fancies to the light of day and peer at them as a target at the end of my sights, to scrutinize them at leisure. My friend laughs at me, and claims it is a factor of my malaise, as I am often subject to a willingness to deny the obvious. Re-reading these notes and my thoughts when penning a recount often leaves me taken aback, asking myself, did this occur? Truly?

Yet how else can a man cope in such uncertain times?  We have been blessed with continuing good fortune, James and I. My friend's consulting business has grown apace, populated by more unremarkable individuals and some small number of royalty. Since meeting her unfathomable presence, the Queen, referrals have come our way that have required travel -- I feel most of use on these trips, as outside of London's familiar streets, James forgets that his network is not there to catch or protect him. My arm is healthy and strong and my hand does not tremble with infirmity when it is a matter of life or death. I had no compunction or challenge with putting down that Russian-bred creature brought by spies to our lands. The grey green and red tinged feathery pelt now hangs in the parlor, quite the testament to our partnership; it stopped stinking some weeks ago.

Such a network of allies and friends -- though he says he has none -- saved him in that unfortunate incident with Miss Irene Adler, though we do not speak of what we know became of her. I take some small comfort that she is, perhaps, self-exiled to the edges of the Isle, in a tavern near the sea, mocking us all for our persistent loyalty to the Queen and the royal family.

I had watched, quiet, as James presented his evenhanded, calm findings to the queen's consort. The Princess was well and safe, and the seditionist was gone, removed from her presence and well revealed to society proper. James had been taken to the Queen's presence again while I stood in the door's threshold, merely breathing and captured with my poor attempts to comprehend her existence. I caught myself wondering how the consort managed it, to have survived so closely at her very feet for so long, and yet it echoed in my head, in my healed shoulder. Companion. I did not grasp it, as I listened to half a conversation and left a scant step before my friend reached the doorway.  There were larger concerns afoot than the missing Miss Adler, and news of his next duty were to follow at the Queen's leisure. It was understood that regardless of what case Lestrade brought us in the meantime, when She sent her envoy, it would be my friend's new focus.  He slept feverishly that night, and I did not sleep at all. There were half thoughts, fringe memories of that flat mirrored lake and the slick of incomprehensible eldritch limbs against my skin. I gave up on sleep, made tea in the kitchen and doctored it with laudanum, serving the both of us.  It made for a lazy morning the next day, and my back was quite poorly as I slept on the floor of his room.

It was with a certain amount of predictability as time ticked away the seconds towards a normality, dare I say it less stained with the memories of shadows, that my companion moved swiftly through the phases of recovery out into the becalmed seas of boredom.

I must confess, for those of us who know James, we know quite how dangerous a time this can be. That penetrating intellect, that keen mind spinning endlessly without surcease turns to mischief if not set at a direction. I had learned that personally, and much to my own gunpowder trap startled dismay late one night after a game of cards. After that, I began to at least make sure he was occupied before I went out to play a hand.  So it was some small relief when the queen's emissary arrived, in the form of Lestrade and his short businessman like posture.

"Mr. Moran, a pleasure once again to see you." Lestrade was all smiles which even I, mere novice of deduction, could tell was a bare precursor to his true business.

I was never sure why he bothered -- he knew that if his case had any merit at all, it would be taken. Even if it didn't have merit, at the worst my friend would take it to humiliate him. "Good to see you as well. He's been chipping at the mantel again." With a pistol.

"Then it would seem that my latest conundrum is fortuitously timed," Lestrade declared. "Or your inestimable landlady will no doubt have cause for more repairs. Another cause close to the Queen's heart." He took off his hat as he cross the threshold. "I do believe Mr. Moriarty has become a favourite."

"He is diligent in his devotion." Ill-tempered in the aftermath, but recovered well and sometimes that ill-temper was the deflation after a solved case more than any presentations back to the Queen and her consort. I knocked on the door to our shared commons. "James?"

"Lestrade once more darkens our doorstep with another case," James answered. He did not even bother to rise in courtesy; such was the perturbations of his mental state. "And a case that our loyalty had to be proven before even its existence was breathed in our presence."

I watched as Lestrade blustered, and swallowed, and chewed through a response. "It is a recent concern, Moriarty. Can you..." He looked over his shoulder, and I stepped into the parlour with him, shutting the door behind myself with a firm click.

"Concerns for security clearly show that, even knowing us, this is a case of the utmost sensitivity to the Royals." James at least sat up and had a faintly interested expression. "So how many sacrifices have gone missing?"

The shock of that statement was like being plunged into the darkest deepest mirror pool.

It is known, of course. It is an obvious thing, a fact, a statement -- the sun is red, the sky is blue or grey or green, dependent on the weather, travelling to battle over sea is a dangerous thing, and there are sacrifices. Yet it is not something I have ever given much consideration, perhaps out of my own itching discomfort.  "Twelve. Twelve sacrifices, twelve months. It has us... Flummoxed." I moved past the man, took my own chair in the parlour, closer by the fire, and fixed my attention on that most recent pelt, rather than consider their discussion. It gleamed like wet tar in the light, and the feathers were thinly red-edged, a pleasant counterpoint to the discussion. "Your attention to this matter is much required." 

"Of course it is," James replied with a penetrating glance. "Such a scandal as this to be made public and what is to become of the monarchy? Now of course, we must clarify... there are sacrifices that are fatal where all is drained, and those that are rituals that feed on dark and nourishing acts and emotions. Are these... escapee's of the former or the latter?"    It was an accepted truth in our society that these things happened only to the deserving. Criminals, Prisoners, traitors to the Crown. When it was spoken of in the circles frequented by my father, it was a given that it was a measure that kept crime and social disorder at a low, and provided an incentive for the lower classes to strive.

I watched dispassionately as Lestrade was silent in response. "The latter. It is." He hesitated, as if actually considering his words, when James was extraordinarily ahead of him. "The challenge is that they were willing, and then they were simply unavailable for the moment of sacrifice. Missing completely. The sacrifice requires willing participants. I don't wish to speak of what the ritual entails, as it is immaterial to your work."   This told me that Lestrade knew what it was, and found it personally unacceptable. That much was obvious even to me.

"What is considered immaterial by the small mind can be vital to the expansive thinker," James replied. "But let your purist nature flinch from the information. It is easily deducible as being of a carnal nature and of a manner that is frowned upon in pleasant society. Perhaps this makes the nature of carnal acts applicable too large a scope...I wonder." 

I watched as James frowned, speculating myself on the conundrum.  It did not shock me when Lestrade relented after a moment. "Two willing sexual partners, one human and another of minor royal blood copulate atop an, you will have to see it, but enclosure will suffice, of a larger manifestation of... well, I don't hazard to guess."

"Indeed." I noted that James's eyes were bright with that burning curiosity of his. "No doubt there would be those who would go to that willingly. To partner a royal, well now, for some perhaps the proverbial cold feet might explain the disappearance. But not of twelve in a row. Twelve implies abduction or coercion. From the fact that you are here, my dear Lestrade, abduction is far more likely."

"This next one must occur. Must, do you understand?" There was a palpable undercurrent of strain to his voice, yet I continued to watch James's exuberant gaze.

"Of course it must." He smiled. "Thirteen being the occult blessed number. You do not have to tell me the obvious."

Apparently it was obvious, and yet I did not understand the intricacies of the esoteric sciences. There were plenty who made it their life's work but I had merely memorised the basic principles as did every reluctant schoolboy. Knowing thirteen was a blessed number was a far cry from knowing how it worked and why it would be so important.

I was quite incapable of such mental approximations, even with my considerable schooling. I have seldom been observantly holy or sufficiently intrigued to choose such above the more immediately applicable physical sciences.

"I presume the dark of the moon is the deadline," James stated. "You will leave the information of the missing sacrifices immediately. Come, Moran, the Game is afoot!"

Lestrade barely stammered out agreement when I, swept up in James's enthusiasm and energy, took leave of our parlour with my friend before our visitor could so much as retrieve his hat.

* * *

We arrived at the site under cover of darkness; late enough to leave me shaken and wishing I were still warm in the parlor, with a book in hand. Shakespeare's Thirteenth Night, something light-hearted to drive away the cold. There were stairs cut into stone behind a locked monolith deep in a park in the midst of the city.

James was practically humming with glee as we approached the site, and I knew every detail was being catalogued. There was a dark fascination with the place; at once terrifying but compelling. 

Steps led downward into darkness, though my companion soon found the gaslit lamps and filled the stone interior with shadows and light.

"I have heard of these, but never gained access before," he said in satisfaction. "It is most intriguing. They bring the sacrifices here not long before the ritual -- a day or two at most." He opened the door to a most opulent room I have ever seen. "The preparation chamber. Interesting. So how, pray tell, my dear Colonel, would you extract a man or woman from this place unseen or unknown?"

"A trap door. Or a portal...?" It was an immediate offer, but I paced the edges, wondering at the fine craftsmanship of the gilded lilies and esoteric statutes and tributes.

"In the room itself, perhaps. I see. That is the solution of the normal man, so are we dealing with a normal man or as I suspect to be the case, a rather more extraordinary nemesis of ours?"

"Extraordinary thinker or not, he is still bound by the physical laws of the world." I felt, knew I sounded dubious as I continued to explore the room. In Qandahar, I once stumbled across an ingenious device of a switch built into the architectural design that had been laid down so many centuries before by those heretical Greeks. I was convinced that if anyone could build such a thing into those most private of chambers, it would be my friend's nemesis. 

"Fascinating, I do believe the dome rises here," he observed, spotting a seemingly invisible mechanism. "Of course it is under the apex of the obelisk. I wonder at the material of it. No doubt capped in Electrum at the very least, as were the pyramids of old." James was in his element, scanning the room with his habitual assessing gaze. "Aha, see here, my dear Moran, the faintest of scuff marks on the floor. Something swings out here, it is a matter of finding the mechanism. And here... interesting. A peep hole I believe worked into the intricate filigree. Most intriguing -- there is skill involved to precisely match the current decoration in such a manner."

He had already decided on who their culprit was, and I was quite delighted to be correct on the how -- I moved to that side of the room, checking for the device. James's fingers reached it at the same time as mine. There was a soft click.

Inside was a recess, bare and plain, barely large enough for two people, and down behind it another sealed door of a very solid construction with a heavy lock.

"Interesting. I suspect this is sealed from the other side to prevent escape," James said, studying the lock in great detail. "The finest construction, un-pickable it would seem, and, I suspect, barred." He gestured impatiently for me to move out of the light, spotting the tiniest of crumbs of something black and sticky that would have eluded my eye. "Aha! What do you make of this, Moran?"

"Something caught in a boot tread?" But not much else, because I was still wondering at the supposed escape hatch that no doubt led to the actual site of the ceremony itself. For twelve in a row to have been thwarted... I was left to wonder what would happen when that crossed to thirteen. "No. It fell from the lock?"  
   
"No, Moran." James practically rolled his eyes at me as he was wont to do when I was being particularly obtuse. "Smell it. The sweet sickly smell of resinous dreams. The question is, is it given to the sacrifices to make them stay or make them go?"  
   
"I do believe, Mr. Moriarty, that you will find it is a little of each," a cultured voice behind us said, startling me into reaction. I spun, reaching for my sidearm in a smooth motion -- Lestrade's lack of worry was not enough to cause me any sense of security, for I did not know who the man was. On turning, he bore an immediate resemblance to Rache, or the man who Mr. Vernet was presenting himself as that night at the end of the show.

"And who are you?"

"Mr. Mycroft Holmes at your service," the man replied. "A minor government official and servant of the crown."

"Of course you are," James drawled sarcastically. "As I am a mere perceiver of clues."

I felt a warm humour spread in my chest, relaxing some of the tension of being so far underground under such dire circumstances. Lestrade looked to the man, and quietly excused himself to a point halfway up the stairwell through which we had entered. It took effort not to attempt to touch the resinous dreams, which I had previously smoked once, quite early in my military career.

"Quite right." He inclined his head, his smile tight and unassuming. "Quite right. While the situation is dire, your presence in this chamber has been noted. We must all vacate."

"Then how will we be able to intercept Rache if you shoo us away from his intended target?" James replied, turning on him. "Do you intend us to simply watch him break the ritual?"

He glanced briefly at an expensive fob watch. "As if you truly need more time here. Fine, Colonel Moran, go home. Your presence is... how shall I put it delicately, making the apex of sacrifice agitated. You may remain, Mr. Moriarty, until you are satisfied with your information." It was a puzzling statement to me at the time, and I did not work to understand it too deeply, for the understanding touched at the edges of my consciousness enough that I did not want to acknowledge it.

"Ah, of course." James looked at me thoughtfully. "Very well. Sebastian..." It startled me to be addressed by my first name. "Perhaps you can hunt for the other end of the access tunnel."

It left me puzzled, but I didn't protest. It was a relief to brush past Holmes and Lestrade, to find himself standing in the cool evening air of the park, outside of the monument. I stood there for some time, gathering myself, before I started to walk carefully, watching the ground. It was the best time to look for tracks, for marks, for differences in the ground, because the light was at the best angle for it. 

As a hunter, it was a task to which I was well-suited, so after a series of ever-widening concentric circles, I did find a devious knot of wood embedded into the earth which, when pulled, revealed a narrow bare earth tunnel into the ground.

There was something about that opening that reminded me of my ordeal in Afghanistan, a deep menace that reached for me, whispering darkness into my thoughts. I could not willingly re-enter such a place unless a life was at stake. I would not. There was no need to do so in that moment, as compelling as it was that it might present a pathway to a solution. I shut the tunnel, careful as I knew how to make the space look no more disturbed than it had been when I found it. Even closed, I felt the ill effects pulling at me. The arrow straight walk back to the monolith was detoured slightly as I pulled a cigarette from my case to smoke it, loitering. The Hanson cab in which we had arrived was still off at a distance.

Old senses came to the fore, seeing a darker shadow within a shadow, the hint of a gleam as eyes darted in the darkness. I was being watched. I moved casually towards the figure as if clueless and oblivious to their presence. Perhaps I could take them; perhaps I could defeat our nemesis here and now in the shadows.

It would be a relief. With that behind us, I hoped to retire to our parlour and shake some of that dark and icy grip from my chest. I exhaled a cloud of smoke, calmly, and took a swing at my watcher.

He had been ready for me from the way he ducked, unfortunately, or had faster reflexes than anyone I have met. I recognised the click of a trigger cocking back.

"That's enough, Colonel," came an unfamiliar voice from the shadows. Not Rache himself.

The eyes hadn't been high enough for Rache, the figure not tall enough. The limping doctor, then, or another adversary. "No, I don't believe it is. You have me at a loss. You are...?"

"I believe you have referred to me as the Limping Doctor," he replied with a hint of dry amusement in his voice. "Colonel Moran, on my word of honour, I do not wish to harm you. I only wish to talk. One conversation, and we both walk away."

I did not glance at our cab, but kept my eyes on the man. "Then we will talk. Do you have a subject in mind? Your last piece of theatre?"

He chuckled a little. "Not as such. No, I felt -- though my companion disagrees -- that you are a man of reason. We share a great deal of history, Colonel. I, too, once fought under the banner of the Queen before I knew the truth."

"What unit?" I knew enough not to fancy the man by arguing that he was insane, or that the words he said were heresy. I might as well have been discussing the weather with him, as I did not want to hear his reconstructionist drivel. I continued to smoke so that I might cover the tremble of my hand.

"Royal Medical corps, attached to the 3rd Norfolk Battalion," he informed. "I was in Afghanistan, too, and... our experiences are mirrors in many ways, save it is my leg that fails me now, not my shoulder."

I watched as he shifted his weight carefully, and shook my head tightly. It was all too close to the surface, and that bloody hole, that bloody damn hole... "I don't want to discuss this."

"Do you think I do?" the man replied in a low voice. "Do you think I want to remember? I fooled myself that it was the only enemy that was like that and I came back to find the truth." He was looking at me intently. "They are the same. They are all the same, Colonel. The myth of willing sacrifices is a lie."

"No. No, it isn't." I had to deny it, because it was part of the fabric of everything we knew, that I knew. To openly compare that slick mirrored pool to something that was the very fabric of the empire... Unthinkable.

"I thought that. But they took my sister, took her from the street while I was away," he said. "Took... her, and broke her because an unwilling sacrifice is tastier to their unwholesome appetites." He said the words with distaste and horror.

It was nothing I wanted to hear nor believe. "You are wasting your time, doctor. There is nothing to be gained by telling me this."

"And if it was your sister taken?" the doctor questioned. "What would you do? Stand aside? She is an addict now, purging the horror with opium and drink, and I fought to protect the one that did this, allowed this. They corrupt everything -- you know this -- you've felt this, and yet you can help them do it to our people?"

I am ashamed to admit that his words were compelling. The man knew how to turn a phrase, which we already knew from the quality of his writing. "And if the ritual fails again, then what?"

"Then one of the gateways between Their place and our world closes permanently." He spoke with finality. This was the highest treason. Not mere anarchy as we supposed, but a plot, a conspiracy against all the monarchy.

I lit another cigarette, unaccountably torn as we stood there in the darkness. It was a world ending suggestion, the kind of decision that lay not in the hands of men. "And without that defence, the Russians would kill us all. You will not succeed again."

"Then offer yourself now to the Royals and be done with it, man," the limping doctor demanded with a spark of fire in his voice. "For they have the scent of you, and your companion, and they hunger endlessly."

I felt my jaw clench as I turned my head to look off into the distance rather than watch the man. "You speak madness, Doctor. The Queen healed me." And why would one such as she do that to one such as me without good reason?

"She removed the mark of an enemy," he offered persuasively. "Moriarty is a favourite now, is he not? Watch him... he will spiral darker and darker into a creeping madness. Perhaps you can stop this from happening."

"You are skilled with words, Doctor. My condolences on your sister." I needed to get away, because I could feel the lure of what he was saying as much as I could feel a tightness clutching at my ribcage, the fear that rose up every time I contemplated the nature of our lords and masters.

"It will happen, Colonel. I weave not words, but speak facts. You and I are mirrors, one on the right, one on the dark, but who is where?" He spoke in a low intense voice. "I, too, am companion to a genius mind, but I have been down this spiral before you and believe me, what happened in Afghanistan is nothing. A fleshy loathsome tip of the fulsome tentacle waiting to wind itself around your lives. You watch your friend and his actions, and see the truth of what I have said."

"This is the world we live in, Doctor!" I shrugged my shoulders tightly, trying to protect myself from what I knew, what I felt in that moment as I turned from him to head back to the monolith.

"I'm so very sorry, Colonel," the doctor said behind me, and I swear I heard sincere sorrow in his tone and regret. Nonetheless, it was seditious nonsense, treason at least, and it was easier to believe he was an anarchist.

It was easier to believe that than to feel that the very root of our nation was corrupt, that it wasn't as we had been told it was. I pulled my coat tighter around my shoulders and stopped outside of the monolith again. "Moriarty?"

"There you are, Moran," James said impatiently. "Did you find anything of use in your lengthy sojourn?"

"The exit tunnel." And the limping doctor himself, though I did not say as much. I was still feeling unwell, and my obvious physical reaction to the tunnel would likely tell James everything he needed to know without having to see it.

"A tunnel made possible by its unwholesome proximity to the nexus point I deduce from the pallor of your face," he said. "Not one to be used on a casual basis, and only in the event of dire need."

And yet the limping doctor had used it, despite our shared backgrounds. How deeply must he believe in his cause to step into that horror, not just once, but twelve times?

Deeper than I immediately felt I believed in anything at all, because clearly he was the one who took to that work, and not Rache. "Quite. Are you finished with your inquiry, then?"

"For the moment. I believe I must think deeply, but I have secured permission to return before the ritual itself," James replied. "Perhaps we can put Rache on a leash for his brother." He gave a brilliant smile at me, at home in the midst of mystery.

I was comforted that someone was at ease in that moment, though the comment caught me unexpectedly. "His brother you say...?"

"Please, the familial resemblance is unmistakeable." James pulled on his gloves. "I suspect it is a case of brothers knowing too closely how the other thinks not sentiment that has resulted in his failure to capture him to date, as I do believe Mycroft Holmes is carved of the purest Arctic ice."

It made me laugh as we headed for the cab, looking over my shoulder. "I'm afraid I didn't follow why... he wanted me to leave."

"Ah yes. Well, he is...adequate, " James opined, which from him meant he had been impressed, of that I was sure. "He plans. Plans within plans, but a spontaneous moment of genius can tumble all his prediction. His brother would undoubtedly know this and seeks the unorthodox means of criminal intent."

"Which is why it is necessary to bring you in." My friend was reliably creative in his genius, even as he fell silent on the trip back to Baker Street. I knew now to mirror his silence, though my own petty fears lapped at the edges of my consciousness.

We had our own routines and I knew not to disturb my James when he was thinking. I confess, I tried to put the words of the Limping Doctor out of my mind.

It had been some time since I had screamed in the night, but that night, the horrors I revisited drew the sounds of horror from me once more. I blamed it on the man's words, not on the nearness to the nexus point, because it was an easier decision to have made. I rose from bed in the middle of the night, and found James quite alert in the sitting room, so joined him in silence as he wrote. When I woke in the morning, he had drawn a blanket around me, and did not comment on the noise as we took our breakfast. 

"Tonight will be the Ritual, and I must ask you, Sebastian. Will you be able to join me?" James asked with uncharacteristic solicitude.

I took my time chewing through a sausage, and nodded as I reached for my tea. "I will. We have a duty to see this through, do we not?"

"Ah Duty, that great motivator," James replied. "You seemed unusually affected, my dear friend. It is not my intention to undo the healing nature of time."

I recall that I did not immediately answer him, that it took me too long to say, "I felt it calling to me."

"I surmised as such from our Mr. Holmes's comments." James sipped from his cup. "The unusual interest of the being must have its source in a particular quality about you."

The comment made me nervous for reasons I could not explain at the time. It was a rising tension in the back of my throat that made me want to declare no, no, I could not be there just before the ritual. "There is nothing remarkable about me."

"Ordinarily, I would be the first to concur with that assessment," James said. "But we must consider the evidence. Your presence caused a reaction in the obelisk and more to the point, Mr. Holmes identified it as you, not me, which means it is information that is accessible to him. No doubt he would have reports upon you, through our service to the queen. Is it your experience or is it something in your blood perhaps?"

I shook my head, and concentrated my attention to the tea before me. "Queen Victoria said I was a companion. That is all I can think of. It could be my time in Afghanistan." 

"A companion, of course!" James exclaimed. "A bloodline mingled with the Royal blood. Of course, why did I not see that before?"

My deliberate ignorance of things that left me shaken was weighting heavier on my mind as I contemplated James's excitement. "What does that mean?"

"Somewhere in your bloodline was a consort to one of the Royals that resulted in a viable child," James looked at him. "Unusual, rare but ultimately powerful and of high status. I do believe your father's family is very old money, is it not?"

"It is." Which possibly explained the source of that status, but we had no royalty in our bloodline. Merely a compatibility? The concept was dizzying, and I had to steady myself with an elbow at the edge of the table.

"Then it is entirely possible that one of you is, if you will excuse the word play, a right royal bastard," James said with an expression of satisfaction. "Blood calls to blood. I would hypothesise that it makes the connection stronger, easier for them to obtain the nourishment they desire."

"I am glad you find this amusing." There wasn't any heat when I said it, leaning back in my chair as I sipped my tea. "Am I a liability in this, then?"

"It is a permutation I must consider, but I believe not," James declared. "They cannot risk taking someone until moments before the Sacrifice, otherwise there would be another substituted. No, Rache will wait until those last moments."

"Then we must wait until those last moments as well." It was a distressing thought to entertain, yet I held onto the idea. I knew what was going to happen, for once, with a clear perception and precognition that would have impressed even James.

"Indeed. Of a certainty, we must," he concurred. "So it is agreed then. We will both be there."

I consented, and then reached for the morning paper, fancying that I could distract myself in the remaining time with the local oddities and news of note.

I spent the hours after that discussion in an odd state of peaceful resignation. I went out that afternoon and played cards with some of the other men I knew from my regiment who had retired more peacefully than I. I penned a letter to my sister, and left it on the table for Mrs. Hudson to post at her leisure, mentioning to her to be cautious due to the information James had imparted on me.

I am not a man of letters, and have never been one for deepest philosophy, but I knew what this plan was to assure the security of our peace. I am sure that in some future era, someone will read my letters and laugh. They will say no small man such as I could have impacted the world in such a pivotal moment. It was... almost acceptable to me, so I was not bothered by the bounce in James's step as we shrugged into our coats to make our way to the ritual site the next afternoon.

As we travelled, James informed me of the particulars of the ritual and the importance of its completion at moonrise. The exit tunnel was to be guarded thoroughly, but, in case, we would be guarding inside the Obelisk itself. It seemed all very reasonable and sensible; however, even as we entered that chamber and I felt the light sting of a needle from behind, I knew that my instinctive interpretation of James's moods and information had been correct.

"You could have just said it." It is perhaps the only accusation I have ever lodged at my dear friend, but there was no need to do that, no need to be anything but forthright on the matter. He was merely so focused on the solution that he lost track of considering others. 

The world swam with the distorted reality of an opium induced haze. "And risk you saying no? Or is that something you are not capable of, Sebastian?" His dark eyes looked almost completely black in the gaslights.

It was the sharpest wound I had ever felt. I knew I protested angrily at him for thinking that of me, that I would put myself before the greater interest. I suspect I said as the drug embraced me, "Not to you."

His eyes were definitely black, completely black now like the cavern pools in Afghanistan and I was lost in them as he did what was needful. And here was the shame of it. I wanted to be willing and dutiful but then in that moment, fear sprang from that place deep inside.

I could have controlled it without the opium cloud. I could have conducted myself with dignity, but I had to push back against it, struggled with James as he stripped me bare. He was as much a part of the ritual then as I, doing only what he knew to be in the best service of Victoria Gloriana. Nonetheless, all that filled my mind were the broken, sharp-edged recollections of torture past, and a bitter taste in my mouth.

It was not as things were on Baker Street. It was not the James Moriarty I held dear, and the pressure of a pull at the back of my senses, a calling squirming presence, distracted.

It is hard to describe the presence of a Royal to those who have not experienced it, and even to those, one rising with the hunger so thick and tangible, it is choking. The sheer and utter horror piercing the veil of drugs as the sensation of _something_ slithered over skin, slick and hungry.

It was not a sensation I could question, for I had felt it before. Nothing so desperately needing, though, never before something so pressing. James took his leave then, and I stretched back on the chaise, waiting for what would surely be my doom. Bitterness at James's dishonesty and fear warred amongst themselves for primacy in my mind.

The Royal would take whatever it needed, without mercy, without quarter and with my limbs entangled and the dome beginning to open that should have been the moment that spelt my doom as the unearthly chorus of the damned seemed to shriek forth from the opening cracks to their distant hellish kingdom.

To see another person in that space, atop the dais with me, was the last thing I expected, and perhaps in my drug addled brain, I was hallucinating it.

"Hurry, Sherlock!" I thought I heard echoing in a surreal way, and there was rage and tightness, the hot gush and unearthly harmonics, and my flesh was painted in emerald as I was gripped and held as though human hands could contend with ones such as they.

The sound below me caught my attention more tightly, as it washed over me and ran away all sharp thought. I tried to move, to pull, to avoid the slimy caress of tentacles holding me fast and down in a way that made me wonder what was coming _up_.

I could feel hands on my flesh, the heat of them in stark contrast to the cold slithering things moving over skin. There was a voice I didn't know, didn't recognise, shouting, "Has he been breached, are we too late?"

Even I was not sure. There was movement crawling all over my body, and in my head.

Clammy undulating movement, and then I felt a press against my nethers that left me fighting like a wild dog to get away. Human hands on my skin and fresh air were an assault on my confused senses just then, the promise of freedom rather than the ice deep howling that threatened to take me.

"No, we were in time," came that familiar voice and then there was the slash of metal through something fleshy, the insane howling pitching to a shriek and then the flinching withdrawal of unearthly polyps and tendrils. 

I could smell the acrid stench of ichor, and, cutting though it, the smell of smoke and the dizzying flicker of flames growing around us as human hands freed me and pulled me close.

The cold outside was less sharp than the cold inside; I admit, on reflection, that perhaps I wept hysterically for a moment, in thick relief to be naked and marked, but alive and above ground, completely uncaring of who had rendered such an unexpected miracle.

There were arms around me, as if they could hold off all the horror that had ever been and ever could be. Something, a rough blanket, wrapped around me that, as I came back to myself, I realised covered my modesty even whilst my rescuer whispered soothing comfort like a balm to the flayed edges of my mind. There was moment when I realised who it was, who was holding me.

A feeling of anguish settled in my chest, for I knew then that we had been thwarted, that the empire was surely doomed -- though as you know, if you are reading this, that Russia had likewise suffered the same fate, and the world quieted for a time afterwards -- and that I had not been able to stop it from happening.

"You are safe now," he murmured into my ear, gentle and soft as if I might break into a thousand pieces. It was strange that he did not gloat or crow in their triumph, for I knew this to be what it was. Instead, he seemed weary and in pain himself.

It was unexpected, even as I protested by shaking my head. I struggled to make words, through the haze of drugs and cold, even as I felt that vast consciousness fade away sharply, like a storm rolling back out to sea. "No, no..."

"You are no longer sacrificed," he said, and exhaled, letting go of me. I felt the absence of his hands like a shock. "You should never have been in the first place. You do not deserve such a fate."

I pulled the rough blanket tighter, finding that my hands worked again, even if my mind felt slowed. "I knew it was coming." A thought that still caught at me, something that had crystallised firmly in my mind.

"That does not mean you deserve it," the doctor told me with utmost conviction. 

"John!" It was a warning shout from the other man, Rache himself it would seem. "Time to go."

I knew I would not be going with them, and I was too disjointed to wonder what had happened to the other twelve, though James later explained it with such ease, as though he had merely read the headlines off of a daily rag. I was shaking as I got more firmly to my feet, still vastly disoriented. "My only friend thought it the most expeditious solution."

"Then you might wish to consider the fact that your _friend_ thought you were worth sacrificing, but your... enemy thought you were worth saving," he answered, and, in that brief moment, the Doctor leaned close and kissed me. Soft, warm, and, dare I say it, tender, and nothing could have stunned me more thoroughly, not even a footpad wielding an iron cosh.

In the moment of my surprise, he turned and half-ran himself into the darkness as flames roared inside the Obelisk.

I wandered away from that now ruined but hallowed monument, disoriented but filled with a singular goal of returning to my rooms.

I was found by James of course, but my confusion remains, even now as I write this. I do not know what to feel any more, for those final words of the Limping Doctor have wormed themselves into my head. Am I the failure I see in my dear friend's eyes when he looks at me, though he claims the responsibility is not mine to bear? I do not know and what shakes me is the uncertainty that plagues me. I look at James Moriarty and wonder. When he gave me as sacrifice was that him...or was it the darkness of which the doctor warned me, taking hold?

And which, of those answers, would be the easiest to bear.


End file.
